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Friday, July 13, 2012

Road Trip Part 5: Red River, NM

This is the road trip that never ends. It just goes on and on, my friends...

The next leg of our trip was heading to my favorite childhood vacation spots. We used to go to Red River, New Mexico almost every summer. I used to fish with my dad, go on walks, shop with my mom, play canasta with the family, play in the icy river, pick flowers, find rocks, and all kinds of other outdoor activities. I have always wanted to take Brian there since he loves fishing and the outdoors. It was great to see the big kids playing and loving it there. Drew...well, he was another story.

Look at the beautiful area! I took pictures of the kids by the river next to our cabin. They had fun finding animals and bugs. They even had a funeral for Bobby the caterpillar, who was not actually dead, just lost. They played with the plethora of moths and built homes for all the insects they could catch.

Our cabin was called Bear Bait. When I was a kid my family all stayed with my parent's friends who owned a cabin up there, but we have such a big family of littles that we rented a cabin and my parents and brother stayed with our family friends in their cabin.

Brian mostly fished. I barely saw him except for dinner and Canasta when the kids went to bed. Early in the morning he sat out and read Pathology journals with his coffee before he headed out with the guys to fish all day. They did take the big kids one afternoon to fish with them.

Now back to Drew, this guy managed to make my vacation a lot of work. You know how I mentioned how obedient he is normally before, well when it comes to eating dirt, pine cones, and other junk on the ground he is a little more stubborn. I could literally not look away from him for more than 2 seconds at a time. He bit off pieces of bark and pine cones and got a mouthful of dirt on many occasions. Gross! And exhausting!

There are remnants of dirt around his mouth in this picture.

Cute, dirty bottom bear crawling in the dirt around the cabin.

"Look, Mom! I found another pine cone to taste!"

A big highlight of the trip for Isaac was the free gun fight show in town. Before the gun fight was Indian dancing. I really enjoyed this part. They were real Indian dances performed by Native Americans.

The gun fight was all for Isaac, although Drew seemed to like it as well. He is not at all frightened by loud noises like Isaac was when he was a baby. So the gun shots didn't bother him at all. I jumped more than he did.

The only thing I regret was not getting more hiking and walking in. Unfortunately, I have done a poor job of teaching my kids to walk even when they are tired. In the high altitude it is even more tiring and the mountains make their poor legs wear out quickly. I love to walk though when the weather is so nice! Isaac is the biggest wuss of them all. He usually doesn't make it past the corner in our own neighborhood.

Where did "A Pew All Our Own" come from?

My husband and I were sitting in church before Mass shortly after we were confirmed into the Catholic Church. Both of our gazes drifted to a pew close by where a family filled up the whole pew. Granted it was one of the shorter pews, not a full length one. I can't remember who said it to whom, but one of us said, "I hope we fill up a pew with our family one day." We agreed it would be wonderful. And so that is what we're hoping for...a pew all our own.

Living the Good Life

At a Castle in Nurnberg, Germany

Love of my life

People think they have to find their soulmate to have a good marriage. You get married, and after 20 years of loving, bearing and raising children, meeting challenges- then you'll have "created" your soulmate. -Diane Sollee